No God in Sight

by Altaf Tyrewala

  This morning I have been so lost in my thoughts that I haven’t noticed the arrival of the two salesmen or of the customers. When Malik shouts at me, his customer looks up in horror. My startled eyes blunder past her upturned face to her low-cut blouse. ‘Eek, so sick!’ the girl shrieks and scrambles out of my range to the rear of the shop.

  Malik looks up and sniggers, ‘Kaka, I’ll drag you down by your dick if you do that again. Didn’t you hear:

  Woodland

  W71, size 6? Get moving!’

  Malik is twenty-four, and I, the man he calls Kaka, am sixty-five.

  I uncross my feet and leap into a squat, and like a prawn I scuttle across the floor of the mezzanine to the far end, where the women’s Woodland shoes are kept. W71—‘W’ for women and design number 71. I pull out a size-6 box and lift the lid. My wife would have liked these shoes, close-toed and flat-soled, sensible through and through.

  In her final years she stopped making sense and became a mad fool. When our son failed his final MBBS exam, my wife said, ‘Take it again.’ Out of the question. We had mortgaged all the jewelry in the house and I had borrowed two lakhs from Amin-bhai. Enough. The family couldn’t afford a student any more. A week later, without her knowledge, Akbar and I paid a quack in Colaba the deposit for the women’s clinic he ran. After saving enough to purchase a degree from the University, the so-called doctor was joining a respected polyclinic as a gynecologist. My son, shamed and matured by his failure, quietly complied with what had come his way. He had studied enough to operate in that nursing home. We didn’t tell my wife. Akbar would leave every morning and return late. For three days my wife wondered where he had started going. On the fourth day she insisted on knowing. ‘He goes to work,’ I told her.

  ‘What? Our son has started working? Where?’

  ‘In three days he has already earned six hundred rupees,’ I said proudly.

  ‘Where does he work?’ my wife persisted.

  ‘At a rented clinic near my shoe shop.’

  ‘Doesn’t even have a degree! What does he do there?’

  ‘Abortions.’

  ‘You old rascal! Are you playing with yourself up there?’ Malik shouts again.

  Too many thoughts! I replace the lid and scuttle back to the opening in the mezzanine floor. ‘Malik, take!’ I call out.

  He stretches up for the shoebox. ‘Kaka, if you take this long again I swear I’ll tell Amin-bhai. Sitting up there like a sister-sleeping king. Come down, no! Deal with the customers!’

  I can’t protest Malik’s behavior. Places of work flatten all differences between people. Malik and I are equals in this shop.

  When I told my wife about our son’s new livelihood, her lips went white and she shook her head disbelievingly, chanting, ‘Ya Allah! Ya Allah! Ya Allah!’ I whacked her on the back; she had become hysterical. ‘Stop this!’ I screamed at her. ‘Thank your Allah that Akbar has started earning! Better days are ahead!’

  Religion killed my wife. We could have lived our futures as proud and comfortable parents. Instead, she was visited by paralyzing worries of sin and all that no-good dogmatic claptrap. First she begged me to stop Akbar from going to the nursing home—she called it the satanic butcher house. Then she attacked our son and threatened him with horrible visions of afterlife; the poor boy turned religious but didn’t stop going to work. After he married, she nagged and nagged our daughter-in-law who just kept quiet and stood by Akbar dutifully.

  There is no Allah, no heaven, no hell. No life after death. No sense in wasting precious hours of life inside mosques and temples and churches. When the stomach buckles and the skin sizzles, money is the only god who can answer prayers. How to tell the idiots in the world this? How to have told the idiots in my family this?

  ‘I want to go for Haj,’ my wife declared one day. I lifted my hand to slap her; my son held it back with just one word: ‘Never.’ He arranged everything for her; he also paid the Haj Committee at Crawford Market five thousand rupees extra for a special seat on the trip. What a waste of time and money and life. A week after she left, our telephone rang like an alarm bell at six in the morning. Akbar and I, startled out of our sleep, charged toward the phone from opposite directions. I picked up the receiver and put it down two minutes later without saying a word. What was there to say? Who had sent her there? Who had encouraged her nonsense? And as the final, treacherous, cruel blow against my son in what was probably the darkest hour of his life, I demanded: Whose bastard livelihood had driven my wife to Mecca?

  How he left home! A few angry words from me in that grief-stricken moment and he was off. As if he had been waiting to be offended so he could snap ties with the click of a suitcase and walk away in a huff. I wonder, do such people return? Can they come back and erase the paralyzing dot-dot-dots in the lives of those they have left behind?

  Akbar has his wife. She loves him fully, and in time they will have children. He is not alone. The thought relieves me.

  It is getting tougher to climb to the mezzanine; these knees have grown a mind of their own, sometimes pliant, sometimes resolutely unbendable. It is old age, of course, although my hair is still black and my teeth intact. It must be because of the dustless environment of the mezzanine; up here it is cool no matter what season reigns outside the shop. But beneath the sparsely wrinkled skin and black hair, this body is slowly and gradually winding up.

  There is a closing-down sale in the shoe shop. Twenty to seventy percent off. Amin-bhai wants to move to America with his wife and three-year-old twins. His father died years ago. It has been two months since his mother expired. Now Amin-bhai has no more ties to India. He says in America he will work at his elder brother’s grocery store. He has generously excused my debts and asked that in return I pray he and his family get visas. Prospective buyers and estate agents have already begun visiting the shoe shop. No new wares are being ordered.

  I stopped praying years ago. I’m not going to start now for Amin-bhai’s visas.

  Amin-bhai

  Rukhshana and I had asked so many, many people to pray for us that I was certain when we arrived at the American embassy our visas would be awaiting us at the entrance. No waiting, no interview. Just a sealed envelope that said, For the Bootwalas: Special Lifelong Visas Granted by Popular Demand to the Divine.

  Ya, right.

  First we have to stand in line for three hours on the footpath outside the embassy. Then we have to sit for two more hours inside. And through all this I have to apologize for having ridiculed Rukhshana’s mother’s (ridiculous) suggestion that we camp all night outside the embassy.

  Sometime close to afternoon, after I have exhausted myself imagining the worst possible scenarios, our names are announced on the sound system: ‘Amin Bootwala and family, cubicle 7… Amin Bootwala and family…’

  We gather our things and our wits together and get to our feet.

  I follow my wife and twins into a tiny cubicle. It is cold and smells of mint, like the America I imagine. Behind a glass screen sits a stout foreigner. In a green shirt and grey tie he looks like a CNN anchor. For the first time since birth, my three-year-old twins don’t fidget. We all stand dwarfed and paralyzed in awe of the American embassy official—our saviour, our deliverer.

  I hope he notes the subtle pinstripes on my five-thousand-rupee suit. I am not anxious about my wife’s lakh-a-piece diamond earrings—they are impossible to ignore. But I hope the interviewer knows how expensive denim dungarees for three-year-olds can get.

  ‘Hey,’ the interviewer says. He is flipping through our forms and passports.

  ‘How you doin’?’ I ask. That’s how American customers greet me at the shop.

  Our interviewer looks up with raised eyebrows. ‘Not bad,’ he says, and looks down again.

  A cold sweat breaks across my back. It is the first such moment since I graduated—when the rest of my life depended on the momentary whim of an unknown official correcting my papers or granting me admission. At least I can see this man’s
pasty face.

  ‘So, Mr. Amin Bootwala,’ the American says, pronouncing my name like ‘amen,’ ‘your visa application says you own a shoe shop in Colaba…?’ He trails off.

  I want to talk and never stop. I want to recount our life histories so this embassy man will believe we are the good ones, the ones who will come back, not the type who will wind up working at some grocery store in New Jersey. The good ones. Rukhshana looks at me anxiously. I say, ‘Right, sir, on Colaba Causeway. It’s called True Shoe, established by my father forty years ago. We are very well-known…’

  The interviewer looks at Rukhshana. ‘And Mrs. Bootwala, what do you do?’

  ‘I’m a housewife. Kids, you know.’ Rukhshana ruffles the hair on one of their heads.

  The embassy man points at our forms. ‘You say here you’ll be visiting your friend in Seattle. Is that right?’

  I start to speak, ‘Uh yes, sir, that…’

  But my reply is nipped by an Indian woman who enters from a door behind the interviewer.

  She doesn’t even look at us. ‘Here you go, Steve!’ She hands the American a sheet of paper and leaves.

  He squints at it. And upon reading the contents of the sheet, our interviewer’s face reddens; his thin lips virtually disappear. He looks up at us and presses the sheet against the glass screen. ‘Man! Can you believe this?’

  SHIT!

  JUNAID!

  They must have tracked his visa application from two years ago!

  They must know my elder brother hasn’t returned!

  They will stamp ‘Rejected Forever’ on our passports and fling them at our faces.

  I panic in the face of failure: ‘I have all my documents, sir!’ I hold up the folder. ‘My bank statements, tax returns, property papers. All latest, all in order!’

  Our interviewer frowns, ‘What’re you talking about?’

  Then he shivers the sheet impatiently and begins reading, ‘Get a load a’ this bull. Blah blah blah… embassy personnel are to observe regular working hours on Saturday 25th owing to vast task backlogs…blah blah blah…many thanks, sincerely…’

  He looks up murderously. ‘You tell me, Mr. Bootwala, do I look like a machine?’

  It’s like God being facile on Judgment Day—you have to go along without seeming slavish or impudent.

  I stare like a nitwit.

  ‘It’s…it’s very unfair for you?’ Rukhshana offers with caution.

  Our interviewer nods vigorously. ‘Thank you, Mrs. Bootwala! I mean, a six-day week? It’s criminal! Like we don’t work hard enough!’

  I frown and smack my lips. Rukhshana purrs empathetically. The twins maintain a sensitive stillness. The American stamps four pink slips and slides them through an opening. They fall into a stainless-steel receptacle on our side.

  ‘I’m tellin’ ya,’ he continues, stacking our passports like playing cards, ‘if this was America, this embassy would a’ been busted for malpractice.’

  I stare at the pink slips.

  ‘Go on, take the receipts, you got your six-month visas,’ the American says. The simplicity of our success is stunning. ‘Pay your money now and pick up your passports in the afternoon, all right?’

  Rukhshana and I begin glutting him with thank-yous. He waves us out modestly.

  ‘Hey, Bootwalas!’ the American shouts after we step out. We stick our heads into the cubicle. ‘You know where to find me this Saturday, right?’ he roars.

  We erupt into joyous, guttural laughter.

  In the taxi, Rukhshana and I exchange grins over our twins’ heads. We won’t have to go to an immigration expert after all.

  I look out the window, at the grey urban landscape whizzing by. The traffic feels comical now, the beggars seem charismatic in their wretchedness, fumes from trucks and buses tickle our sinuses, and when Hamid’s asthma acts up like it always does—he was born with it—Rukhshana cuddles him and covers his face with her sari. ‘Shh…’

  Hhzzz. My son’s wheezing struggles to be heard over the din of electric horns, old engines, bus bells, and barking dogs. Farid clutches his brother’s hand. ‘Roll up the windows,’ Rukhshana says. The taxi driver and I obey. Rukhshana rubs Hamid’s tiny chest. The old anger returns. Hhzzz. Rukhshana and I exchange helpless glances. ‘Shh… shh…’ Hhzzz. Hhzzz. This dusty, dirty country. This dump of a subcontinent that will kill each one of us.

  Hamid, exhausted by the attack, falls asleep. I extricate Farid’s hand from his brother’s death-like grip.

  The taxi pulls up outside our colony. ‘Take an off today?’ Rukhshana tempts me. I hand her Hamid.

  ‘Start packing, we’ll fly as soon as possible,’ I say.

  Rukhshana seems alarmed.

  I close my eyes reassuringly. ‘We’ll manage.’ I pat the taxi driver’s shoulder. ‘Let’s go.’

  In half an hour I am at the shoe shop. I stand outside on the footpath and look up at True Shoe, at the cream and black signboard, at the tinted glass entrance and the barely stocked shelves of footwear inside.

  There are no customers. When I enter, Malik and Bhupendra, the two salesmen, don’t stand up, they don’t even stir. Since Kaka’s death nine days ago, employee morale has plunged.

  ‘How’s business?’

  ‘Cold,’ Malik mumbles.

  I sit in the leather chair behind the cash counter. The bill book indicates only one sale for the day. A pleasant surprise, actually, considering there’s nothing in stock but outdated ladies’ sandals, Hawaii chappals and kids’ shoes.

  I load two envelopes with three thousand rupees each. ‘Get your bags,’ I say.

  Malik and Bhupendra remove their plastic bags from the closet. They come to the counter. I stand up to give them their last and final pay. They don’t ask unnecessary questions. Did I get my visa? When am I leaving? My salesmen are smart. I was worried for Kaka, but he, like everything else, is now a closed chapter, finished and done under six feet of fertile graveyard grime.

  ‘Best of luck, Amin-bhai,’ Bhupendra says.

  ‘Ya-ali-madad, Amin-bhai,’ Malik says as he follows his colleague through the door.

  ‘Mowla-ali-madad,’ I say. ‘Down the shutter half!’

  Malik nods.

  And probably for the first time in forty years the shutter of True Shoe stands at half mast at three in the afternoon on a normal, working, non-holiday.

  Here’s how it will happen:

  I will telephone Mr. Lakhani.

  Before sunset he will arrive at the shop with a briefcase containing money and I will sign away this 300 sq. ft., forty-year-old institution of sorts for fifty-three lakh rupees, seven lakhs below its market value.

  The house will be in a mess when I return. The kids will be at the neighbor’s. Rukhshana will be hyperventilating over all the things that need packing, all the things that need salvaging, saving, stowing. I will seat her on the bed. I will place my hands on her shoulders and tell her to take just our clothes, that’s it, only our clothes.

  A week later—after seven days of shopping, discarding and disconnecting—my wife, my two children, and I will come out of our flat for what I hope will be the last time in our lives. The time will be nine p.m. We will have five whole hours to go before takeoff. I will padlock the main door to the house; we will already have sealed its windows and switched off its electric main.

  We will haul five suitcases into the back of and atop the roof of a taxi. My carryall will contain photographs of my parents, Rukhshana’s parents, and of our vacations—first as a couple and then as a family.

  On our way to the airport we will keep the windows up.

  We will become worried and impatient in the long check-in line. The police will question us. Passport officials will question us. I will answer patiently. I may even smile.

  And finally we will have finished with all formalities. We will haul our hand luggage and our children toward the departure lounge.

  Two hours later we will board the plane. And my children, like children are wont
to before takeoff, will start crying, screaming, bawling. Other children will join in like members of a sullen choir.

  Below the howl of takeoff, the city of our birth—the nation of our ancestors—will fade into a twinkling sprawl of lights and then into a distant flicker and then it will be gone, gobbled and blackened by distance. It wasn’t worth it, I will tell myself. And I will repeat, like a mantra, like a dua, it wasn’t worth it, it wasn’t worth it. And even then, if my idiot nostalgia refuses to die, I will remember the protection money demanded, the covert and blatant religious slurs, the riots, the aftermaths, the newborn niece named Nidhi, the rewritten history books, the harassment at the passport office. Wasn’t it enough, wasn’t it enough that we lived in our ghettos and worked in our holes and paid our taxes and demanded nothing in return?

  The aircraft’s projection screen will show a blue India, with our plane’s route so far outlined in white like an anemic tapeworm in the belly of a diseased nation.

  I will sit back in my seat and pretend to breathe easy. Forget it, I will tell myself, let go. Let them have it, let them have what they have killed clergymen for, razed mosques for, driven out fellow Indians for.

  Let them have their Hindustan for Hindus.

  THE VERY BEGINNING

  Babua

  Namaste. My name is Babua. I live in Barauli, a village like any other village.

  Today is my sixteenth birthday.

  It is mid-morning. I am napping on a charpoy under a hay shack located on the outer edge of my father’s orchard. I hear a lascivious giggle. I open my eyes and find Lajwanti, the most recent addition to our gaggle of village nymphos, lolling against one of the poles. She is wearing a yellow skirt and a red come-hither blouse. ‘What you want?’ I say.

  ‘Aye, take me rey,’ she says.

  Lajwanti is a worker’s daughter. I am overjoyed that I, the landlord’s son, have been included in this working-class sweet-sixteen deflowering tradition. Truly, there is nothing more democratic than sex. ‘Let’s go!’ I say.